Villar lauds McDo over ad withdrawal

Senate President Pro Tempore Manuel Villar cited yesterday McDonald’s for immediately withdrawing a controversial advertisement that he said ran against Filipino culture.

This came as McDonald’s executives led by Joseph Lau, managing director, paid him a courtesy call at the Senate to formally announce their withdrawal of the television advertisement.

"They made a fast reaction to my comments against the advertisement," he said.

Villar said that the advertisement, which showed a father bribing a child with french fries to induce the latter to say they look alike, would promote a wrong moral value to the young.

He said that unless advertisements promoting wrong values are immediately corrected, people might take them as regular ones.

McDonald’s expenses in producing the advertisement would now go down the drain with its withdrawal.

Lau, however, refused to say how much his firm spent for the production of the withdrawn advertisement.

"The amount is not as important as giving correct values," he said.

During the meeting, Villar also commended McDonald’s after learning that it has been sponsoring a number of worthy community projects.

"Obviously, McDonald’s is a very responsible company," Villar said. McDonald’s said they would continue to air the "Lolo" advertisements, which has already won a lot of awards. – Efren Danao